C&T Intergenerations Program at the Ring House

Every time we came into Ring House, we could encounter an elderly who always wanted us to show her some pictures of flowers online. On our last Ring House activity, I was lucky to help her. Her name is Rose, which is identical to her favorite flower. Without hesitation, I logged on to the computer, repeatedly searching for pictures of flowers in the following 40 minutes. It seems that Mrs. Rose was a connoisseur of gardening, for she was quite familiar with most of the species and planting techniques.“Are you eager to learn, young man? Or are you uninterested?” she would ask me. Through our conversation, I could see that Mrs. Rose was quite eager to share her knowledge on plants with others.At the end of the activities, Mrs. Zhang, surprisingly, told us that Mrs. Rose actually suffered from Senile Dementia, a syndrome that confined her memory within two decades ago, in which she was strongly interested in gardening.Mrs. Rose’s handicap is unfortunate, but it coincidently extracted her most glorious point. If one had to abandon all but one memory in his life, would they make their decision by their passion rather than rational consideration?Mrs. Rose’s story reminds me of a Chinese benevolent commercial about a senior, who also suffered from extensive loss of memory. In a banquet, he fortuitously grabbed a dumpling in his pocket, claiming it was his son’s favorite food. Such things are essential for a contented life. One needs to have something that he ardently loved.